


Do Not Be Prey

by soulshrapnel



Series: Playing With Fire [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Ableism (kinda), Bondage, For Some Reason No One Gets Force Choked In This One, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Kink Negotiation But Not Enough Of It, M/M, Please Do Not Do BDSM With Darth Vader, Sadomasochism, Space Fascist Disaster Boys, Telepathy, Topping from the Bottom, Verbal Humiliation, pain play, porn with only a little bit of plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 20:04:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17567111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soulshrapnel/pseuds/soulshrapnel
Summary: Grand Moff Tarkin had always assumed that sex with Darth Vader was impossible. But a minor Imperial scandal proved otherwise, and now Tarkin can't get the idea out of his head.





	Do Not Be Prey

**Author's Note:**

> This kinda needs some content warnings but I'm shitty at content warnings, so. The tags should give you some idea what to expect. Play safe.

"Lord Vader," said Grand Moff Tarkin across the table in his office aboard the command ship, "there have been… concerns raised, among my men, about your recent schedule."

Vader regarded him impassively, his breathing apparatus making its usual rhythmic sound.

Very few men in the Empire could meet Darth Vader's gaze - such as it was, the eyes invisible behind the reflective black mask. Most gave Vader either too much respect or too little: quailing at the sight of him or failing to take him seriously at all. Neither type lasted long in Vader's presence. Tarkin prided himself on his Theory Of Dealing With Vader. He had known the man for many years, and he liked to think he did better than most.

He liked Vader. Tarkin enjoyed competent people, and he enjoyed impressive weapons. Today, as usual, Vader had been both: he had efficiently mopped up an entire squadron of Partisan bandits, swift and daring flyers who had given the rest of the fleet no end of trouble. It would have been a perfect success, if not for the fact that Vader had arrived to the battle more than two hours late.

"My schedule is none of your men's concern," said Vader evenly.

"Not generally, no. But I previously had your assurance and the Emperor's that you would be available for emergencies like these. When my men sent for you, you were neither at your post on Mustafar nor reachable by comm link. It took some time to convince your personal staff to give up your location, and more time for my men to reach you, and now instead of attending to their next duties, they are all talking about where you _were._ This is not acceptable."

Vader being late was one thing; delays could cost lives, but they happened all the time and for all sorts of reasons. The real problem had been Vader's location. Tarkin's men had found him at last, on a neighbouring moon, at what Tarkin understood to be an elite, specialized, and very discreet sex club.

Even that club, as such, would not have been much scandal on its own. Heaven knew Tarkin had used to frequent such establishments himself. But he had trouble with the sheer cognitive dissonance of finding _Vader_ there.

Tarkin had always understood Vader to be asexual. He could understand _other_ people being attracted to Vader; there was the usual pull of dangerous power, and there was a certain dark elegance to him. But Tarkin understood something of the nature of the injuries that had left Vader in his life-support suit. Surely that body, half-machine now, must be too broken to even feel pleasure. He had once heard a rumor that Vader had had a wife, hidden away somewhere, before he was Vader; but surely that sort of thing was all over now.

It irritated him more than he could explain. He would have to deal with his gossiping men. Worse, he would have to reassess his Theory Of Dealing With Vader. He wasn't even quite sure what part he had got wrong.

"The Emperor," said Vader, "is my commanding officer in these matters, not you. He will determine what reprimand is necessary. There was no need for you to bring me here and scold me yourself. Unless you had some personal concern?"

His tone was goading, suggestive: enough that Tarkin blurted the next thing against his better judgment. "Vader, how is it even _possible-_ "

Vader stood abruptly, towering over the rest of the office. "Were you under my command, I would kill you for asking."

Tarkin smiled blandly up at him. Theory Of Dealing With Vader: do not show fear. The animal that, that shows its belly, is prey. Do not, under any circumstances, be Vader's prey. If you showed him he could rule you through fear, he would never, ever let you undo it.

"Yes, one of your charming overreactions. I think we can discuss this like reasonable people, don't you?"

Vader stood silently, only his breath filling the room. Two breaths.

"The sordid details are your business," Tarkin explained. "But I do need to know what to say to my men and what I can expect going forward. Does the Emperor know?"

"You can tell your men that it is none of their concern. I will deal with anyone who disrespects me. But you." But he moved to sit down again, the immediate danger eased. Something darkly amused had crept into his voice. "You are asking as a friend."

Perhaps he was. Tarkin did not fully understand why this felt like such an urgent problem to him, itching so far under his skin.

"The Emperor," said Vader, "permits any activity which can strengthen my connection to the Dark Side of the Force. He knows."

Tarkin quirked an eyebrow. "I'm sorry, I don't follow. How is this a Force issue?"

"The power of the Dark Side flows from the darkest passions, all those that the old Jedi Order denied. Fear. Anger. Hatred. Pain. The capacity to cause pain and take pleasure from doing so. The more one truly enjoys the Dark Side, the more open to its power one can be."

Tarkin laughed shortly. "You needn't dress it up in mysticism for me, Vader. I understand sadism."

"Do you?"

The question was odd, mocking. It suddenly discomfited Tarkin. He regretted this conversation. He was nosing into things that were, obviously, none of his business, and he felt unaccountably that he hadn't even asked the right questions _._ He moved to get up.

"Governor Tarkin," said Vader. "Your feelings betray you."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I felt it as soon as you summoned me here. You are not here to quell a scandal among your men. You are here for yourself. You are curious. You are - _envious._ "

Tarkin opened his mouth to deny it. Then shut it again.

He was, wasn't he? That explained everything about his own reaction that had been puzzling him, all the irritation that seemed out of proportion to the actual events. He had liked Vader for so long. He had thought himself better than others at understanding the man. And then his lieutenant had come to him in scandalized glee, with a whisper that his messengers had _interrupted Lord Vader during sex_ , and Tarkin had been coldly enraged at his own failure to understand how that was possible. How Vader could do any such thing. And, even more, that it had perhaps been going on all this time without him.

Tarkin was not Force-sensitive in the least, but he also did not have the weak sort of mind which was vulnerable to a Jedi's mind tricks. Vader had said it first, but he was quite certain that the realization was his own.

Which left him in a tricky position, because he had not had time to process what he wanted to _do_ about this, and a very frustrated Vader was getting up out of his own chair, prowling closer, looming over him.

" _Friend_ Tarkin," said Vader. Tarkin was wary of that tone, of that predator's stalk. "If I had sensed interest from you before, I would have come to you years ago. But until now, I sensed nothing. You did not think of me as worthy of desire. You thought of me as - broken. Incapable of human lust, not because I had never been interested, but because of what was done to me. You thought I had become a _machine._ But now you learn differently. And now you summon me, you try to reprimand me like some enlisted man, only because you are angry that you have not already had me for yourself. Your feelings are unworthy of you. I should destroy you for them."

"You will do no such thing," Tarkin snapped, staring him down. Or - technically - up. Vader stood very close to him now, a towering bulk. "Because that would be ridiculous."

A breath more passed in a sort of crackling tension. Strange, Tarkin thought, that he was counting Vader's breaths and not his own.

Vader had been interested in him for _years_ \- had he heard that right? That could not be possible.

"No," Vader said at last. "I will not destroy you, _friend._ If you are offering yourself, I will take you. Here. Now. I will hurt you as I have hurt all those others whom you envy. I will use you for my pleasure in my own way. You will be in my power, and you will learn what you wish to learn, as you should have known to ask me for from the start. Do you want that?"

Theory Of Dealing With Vader: do not be prey. Vader was asking him to _agree_ to be prey. Agreeing would be foolish. Refusing would be cowardice, which was worse. He did want it.

Back in his clubgoing days, Tarkin had normally preferred the dominant role, but he had switched before. He would be capable of it here, he thought. Tarkin's office was not the ideal place, but least there were no security cameras, and the door automatically locked.

Theory Of Dealing With Vader, then: be clear about boundaries.

"Here are my terms," said Tarkin crisply. Negotiation in the clubs he had frequented was often quite elaborate, but Vader in this state would need the abbreviated version. "No choking." He had seen entirely too many officers die that way; he would never be comfortable with it. "Nothing injurious. Nothing that would impair me from returning to my duties at full capacity in, oh, say-" He mentally recalled his schedule. "An hour's time. Agreed?"

The amusement had returned to Vader's tone, the overt anger ebbing. "As you wish."

Abruptly Tarkin felt himself thrown across the room and flattened against the wall. There was a familiar grasping motion, and for a nauseating second, he half-believed that Vader was going to ignore his terms altogether. That the offer itself had been a lie, and he would be choked to death after all. But the invisible vise closed on the rest of him, not his throat. On his torso, arms, and legs. Leaving him pinned and motionless, but breathing.

He forced himself to refocus. Choking was the more common death for officers, but Tarkin had seen enemy soldiers die this way, too, flung brokenly across the room like so much junk. Tarkin had not been injured by it, only alarmed. There was no pain, yet.

Anyone could kill given credible weapons and the right opportunity. Vader could kill him with a thought. _Did_ he trust Darth Vader, really?

Well, too late to second-guess himself about that.

With another gesture, Tarkin's uniform was efficiently peeled off of him. Buttons neatly unbuttoned themselves, boots slipped off - he had not realized, until now, that he was being held about a foot off the floor. Everything fluttered down into an undamaged pile.

Vader stepped closer, looking him up and down. Tarkin was not especially proud of his looks. He had kept in shape like any officer, but he mainly felt old and thin. Whatever Vader thought of it was not visible.

"Good," said Vader. "For this hour, you are mine."

The pressure around Tarkin's body lacked any particular texture, but it felt warm, strong, alive. His chest was compressed, allowing only shallow breath, but enough of it. His arms were pinned at his sides, and his legs likewise, ramrod-straight. Flexing his limbs, he found that he could not move them an inch; but his neck and head were free.

A feeling of motion, then, beginning at his collarbones and traveling gradually, languidly down. Tarkin had expected Vader's gloved hands on him, or perhaps phantom hands and fingers, but this was not quite like that. More like some great, snakelike beast flexing around him as he settled in its coils. It tested an inch of him at a time, prodding, sliding, seeming to react and flow faster when it noticed something tender. The sensitive spot at the base of his chest, an inch below the nipples: an idiosyncratic erogenous zone that his lovers often missed. The knot between his shoulders that had been bothering him more and more, these past few years. The more obvious clusters of nerve endings in the palms of his hands, in the fingertips, and downward.

Vader was silent as he worked, absorbed in whatever this exploration felt like to him. Only his breath echoed in the room, mechanical and even.

The questing motion slid down Tarkin's belly and hips. It easily found his cock, still hesitantly soft, and explored that in minute detail. Only a single pass, though: then it moved on and downwards. The pressure around him curled around his buttocks, briefly cupping them. It hovered at his perineum, and then something slid inside: a strange feeling, small and undemanding and frictionless, which cast around for a moment, gave one teasing pulse against his prostate, then winked out. further down. His inner thighs. A bruise on his calf that had been bothering him slightly today. The soles of his suspended feet.

Nothing hurt yet, but it was clearly not supposed to. Tarkin knew this phase, the prelude: the tightening and testing of each individual restraint, the hovering inspection of the willing victim. But seldom had Tarkin been mapped out so thoroughly, without even a word.

His heart was beating faster now, with anticipation.

"Good," Vader said again. "Your senses are clear to me now, my friend. You have as much range as I had hoped. You will have no secrets from me for this hour. Now we will begin."

He made another small gesture. There was a small, electric lash across Tarkin's shoulders: an odd sensation unlike the forms of impact play he was familiar with. Hard but flexible, stinging, crackling. It was followed by another, stronger: then a third, equally strong, inside his thigh, where by rights nothing ought to have be able to hit him, since his legs were pressed together straight beneath him. A strange, pleasurable buzz began to bloom across his skin: this was also the Force. Physically, Vader had touched him with nothing.

Jolts of pain followed unpredictably across his body, digging into each of the sensitive spots that had been found earlier, returning to some. The sensation changed as it was tested, seemingly at random: cold pain, hot pain, sharp pinching pain, back to the original semi-electric one. It alternated with that strange buzz, with pleasant warmth, with odd caresses across stretches of skin that liked to be caressed: enough to keep him aroused and interested through the pain, though his hardening cock was left alone, for now.

The different pains were robust, but not unmanageable. Tarkin found he could breathe through them, even with the restricted breaths his Force-restraints allowed. Drift in sensation and focus on the sight of Vader before him, the small intent movements that seemed to have little enough to do with their results. He had not given himself permission to really admire Vader before. Vader was a beautiful creature: the black shining mask that served as his face, the deadly elegance of him, the strength that seemed to radiate where there might only have been heaviness, the magic at his beck and call. He had been foolish, before, not to admit his attraction.

A harder strike came, sharp across the backs of his calves where he was bruised. A second later, something alighted at the base of his cock, something a little more like a hand now, dragging so lightly up his shaft as to be barely perceptible. Tarkin leaned into the teasing stroke, thinking, _yes:_ his fear had receded, now that the scene was underway. This was all pleasant enough. Tame, even, now that he had grown used to the strangeness of being touched without touching. If all Vader wanted to do was beat him a little and stroke him off, there was nothing wrong with that. But his bluster at first, his predator's stalk, that first startling rush towards the wall: all this had led Tarkin to expect something rather more perverse.

Come to think of it, Vader hadn't spoken at all since this began. Only his breathing, as always, had filled the room. That irritated Tarkin. He liked Vader's voice, deep and resonant and commanding. In a strange way he had liked the way Vader challenged him, the fear he'd created, though Tarkin was always careful not to show his fear. He wanted more of that.

"Come now," he said lazily, "is that all you have for me?"

"If you want more," said Vader, "you will ask."

This lit a small note of warning in Tarkin's brain. He hated begging. Pain was fine; Tarkin had a high tolerance for that, even enjoyed it from an interesting hand. But dominants who expected him to fawn on them, to make himself small, to snivel: Tarkin had a very low tolerance for those. It was one of the reasons why he didn't switch more often.

He had forgotten to specify this in their negotiations; he had been too focused on the ways that Vader might actually harm him to sort out the rest of what they did and didn't want. Well, best to steer the scene away from that now. He could ask for what he wanted, but he'd be assertive about it, at least.

"Your technique is good, Vader, but you simply aren't engaging me mentally. I preferred when you were telling me what you'd do to me. Speak to me more."

A crackle of pain across the soles of his feet. "You will not _order_ me. If you want more, you will ask with respect."

But he was, in fact, speaking more, and his grip had tightened ever so slightly, perhaps without intending to. How delightful. Tarkin wondered how long he could keep Vader talking, just by goading him, before Vader realized his mistake. "We agreed I'd be yours for an hour, Vader. I don't recall agreeing to respect you."

The Force-vise around his limbs tightened to the point of pain; he felt his ribs creak, his elbows protest.

"Perhaps you forget," said Vader, "that you are entirely at my mercy. The Force itself is at my command, and you are insignificant in its grasp. Do you not realize who I am?"

This was such an absurd line that Tarkin had to stifle a laugh. Of course he knew who Vader was. Everyone who saw Vader in his suit for half a second knew who he was. But it was even more absurd, the _most_ absurd, to direct that question at Tarkin. He and Vader had worked together, on and off, nearly since the beginnings of the Empire. He had liked Vader since _before_ he was Vader - they had met a few times during the Clone Wars. Both of them were much older now, and of course Vader looked very different, but every now and then, Tarkin still caught a glimpse of that Jedi boy he'd been at first, cocksure and petulant.

"Of course I know who you are, Vader. A few minutes ago we were sitting in my office like civilized people, discussing the type of work we've been doing together for the Empire for _years._ Did you think I was some starstruck civilian?"

Oh, but he could see it now. It entirely made sense. Vader had been going to the clubs with people who _didn't_ know him. Rich civilians and low-ranking officers, swooning with terrified submissive delight at the mere idea Darth Vader was in the room with them. People who had never had to break up a squabble between Vader and some general, or listen to him complain about the command ship's inferior bacta supply, or read yet another report from the hangar crews about how roughly he treated his TIE fighter. Vader didn't actually have to be any good at it, for people like that. His name was enough.

Tarkin had encountered his share of those people in his clubgoing days, even before he was Grand Moff. Social climbers who wanted him to wear his work uniform so they could say, _yes, Governor Tarkin, whatever you say, Governor._ He found it tiresome; he got enough of that at work.

But Tarkin, no matter his rank, was clearly only a man. Vader's mystique was far stronger. He would have had difficulty finding anything else.

Vader had never fucked anyone before who had a Theory Of Dealing With Vader.

He must have realized that, too, just now. The vise loosened again, though Tarkin still couldn't move. "Perhaps I want you to be silent."

"Then perhaps you should make it worth my while."

Vader Force-struck him again, and this time it was larger, harder, breathtaking: it seemed to knock his whole body off balance, despite how firmly he was being held.

"If you cannot resist the urge to speak," said Vader, "then you will count for me."

Tarkin smiled slightly. He recognized this game. It was also a very slight admission of defeat on Vader's part: it meant he hadn't been able to come up with a punishment or threat to enforce what he'd asked for at first.

"One," said Tarkin.

The burst of pleasure that rewarded him was equally strong, a flare that began at the base of his cock and rushed both up and outwards. He caught his breath - and the second strike came.

"Two."

In the rush that followed, he allowed himself to really look at Vader again. Even Vader's clumsiness with him was adorable to Tarkin in this moment. He liked Vader's strength, his magic, his voice. He liked Vader's recklessness, despite himself: the pure destructive energy he was known for, the arrogance, the way he single-mindedly focused on a goal. The thirst to intimidate, which he'd begun to turn on Tarkin just as this began. The way he'd moved for Tarkin so forcefully, as soon as they'd both realize this was possible, without even pausing to consider what Tarkin would need from him and whether or not he could do it.

Another strike, across a part of his lower back that he hadn't even realized was sensitive. His body shuddered. "Three."

The strange frictionless thing that had briefly pulsed inside Tarkin, at the beginning, flared back to life. Vader was fucking him now, inside and out: long, slow, irregular strokes, designed not to bring him off but to tease him. This was terribly good; Tarkin's eyes fluttered shut in pleasure, involuntarily, for a moment.

But Vader wasn't talking anymore, and that would not do.

A fourth strike interrupted him as he tried to plan. And a fifth, which he also counted, obediently. Vader paused before the sixth.

"You want something else," said Vader, "don't you?"

It was not the teasing or taunting that Tarkin would have expected; not another clumsy attempt to make him beg for more. Vader sounded - confused.

The poor inexperienced man. He could sense Tarkin's feelings, after all. He could that tell something wasn't connecting. He simply had no idea what to do about it.

"You're really doing very well," Tarkin assured him. Perhaps this counted as _asking respectfully_. He didn't know. "It just seems that you're too focused, that you're having to drift into your own little world to do it. I'm not wholly made of sensation. If I'm going to play like this, I like partners who can talk dirty. It isn't difficult. You can say whatever's on your mind. Describe to me what you're doing. How you feel. How you sense me feeling. Or describe me."  His mouth quirked with mischief. "Tell me what I am to you."

"What _you_ are?" Vader repeated scornfully. He hit Tarkin with something new, a brief harsh sting like a line of fire up the muscles of his back. "You presume a great deal, Governor Tarkin."

"Indeed?" Yes, he thought. This would be easy, as long as he could keep supplying prompts. "Really, what part am I being presumptuous about? A few minutes ago you found out I was attracted to you. You complained that I should have felt that way years ago and that I was being disrespectful, yet also leapt in and insisted we do it immediately. Am I being presumptuous to deduce from this that I mean something to you?"

The slap was to his face this time: lighter than the other strikes, but startling, jerking his head to the side, as nothing else had touched him above the collarbones at all.

"You do not understand your role in this at all," said Vader. "You are mine for this hour because you have volunteered. You agreed I would use you. What I do to you now, I do for myself, not you. _You_ are nothing."

Vader's Force-grip on his shaft had tightened slightly. "Yes, Vader," he breathed. "Tell me what I am."

Across his back, again, another shuddering blow. "You are nothing but a fool who thought that if you asked, you could possess me. But I am the one who possesses you."

"Yes."

"You are my plaything. My toy."

Tarkin's toes curled. He knew he should stop here. But he had an animal need now to keep prompting, keep goading. Otherwise Vader might run out of things to say again. "And how long did you covet this toy, Vader?"

"It was of no concern to me."

"I think otherwise. I rather think you wanted me brought down to your level. Anyone else in the Empire is yours to dispose of, should you wish. But you thought you could neither have me nor destroy me. That maddened you, didn't it?"

He should stop. He should not be saying this. He should not make Vader even think about destroying him; that was the whole point of the Theory Of Dealing With Vader. But he couldn't stop.

He had been amused, before, by Vader's clumsiness, but here was a clumsiness of his own. He was out of practice at controlling himself, reckless with pleasure. Vader might not have had a partner who challenged him, but how long had it been since Grand Moff Tarkin got laid? Too long, apparently.

Vader stepped closer to him, slowly and deliberately, drawn in. "You think I cared so much for you, when an endless supply of other submissives were ready to do as I asked them? Be mindful of your pride. It serves you poorly."

Tarkin tried not to wonder if he was jealous or not. Surely not; none of those other people knew how to handle Vader as he did. He appreciated the effort, though. "If you wanted your other submissives, you could have gone home to them by now."

"Perhaps I should correct that error," said Vader, but he did not withdraw. He stepped closer still.

The Force-thing fucking Tarkin from the inside had been steadily growing, the size of a pair of fingers now or a small toy, still unerringly hitting its mark. Tarkin was winning, he thought. "But you wouldn't do that," he purred. "Because then you'd spend the _next_ several years wondering what went wrong here, and why you couldn't please me."

He had somehow hit a nerve; the next strike was across his face again.

"I do not have to please you," Vader said coldly.

"Yet you're doing such a good job."

He hit Tarkin twice this time, sharp stinging blows across his shoulders. "You still fail to understand how I am using you. You are my toy. Your body and your senses give me pleasure. _Your_ enjoyment is a byproduct. _You_ do not matter."

Tarkin would be close to coming if he kept this up. He was giddy. He wanted to hit more nerves, _find_ more nerves. He picked a stray thought, recklessly, at random. "Is that how you spoke to your wife?"

He realized it was a misstep immediately after he said it. For a split second, Vader was absolutely still: both pain and pleasure vanished, leaving nothing but the vice grip around Tarkin's body.

Then Vader lifted him bodily and threw him across the room.

There was a crack of overwhelming pain, entirely unlike everything that had come before, pain so intense that he believed for a moment Vader had broken his back, crushed his skull. No - that didn't fit, it wasn't the bone-cracking pain of an impact, it was a _tearing_ pain, it was-

Everything was a wheeling, disorienting blur. He was, somehow, upside down. He was flying again, he was - flesh tearing from bone, breathless impact, surely his bones were about to shatter, he was -

He had misstepped _badly._ He had known that he was playing with fire, that Vader could kill him with a thought, and instead of being mindful of that knowledge, he had gotten off on it. He had provoked Vader, deliberately, stupidly, straight into _this._ Now Vader would kill him, and-

He landed hard on the floor, on his back, and a sound escaped him like one of the groans of terror he'd heard from prisoners during interrogation. He could not catch his breath enough to scream. He felt his skin coming off, his stomach splitting, his-

Wait a moment.

No, he felt all these things, but these were killing agonies - an absurd number of different killing agonies, some of which actually _contradicted_ each other - and he was alive. Vader could kill him with a thought, but he was alive.

Vader was not going to kill him.

He strained his neck to look down at himself. He felt that his body was tearing apart, but there was no injury. No blood, no breakage, no missing skin. None of that was real. Vader had not injured him. Vader had _kept to the agreement_. Vader had not injured him, Vader had done nothing whatsoever to his neck. Vader was not going to kill him Vader was _not going to kill him_ , this was Vader's idea of _not killing him-_

He had an urge to laugh, but it came out as a series of whimpers. His heart hammered. He needed to stop his panic, but he could not _breathe_ enough, he could not-

It occurred to him, in some irrelevant corner of his mind, that Vader's own breath had never changed. Even now, it was steady, mechanical, rhythmic. Vader could not breathe any faster or slower than his suit allowed, no matter how he felt, what throes of rage or lust or terror.

A red agony burst from Tarkin's feet and cracked its way violently up his spine. He arched, or tried to, or was compelled to feel an illusion of himself arching. His vision dissolved into spots. When it cleared, Vader was crouched over him, very close. There was something odd in his posture: a strained, trembling heaviness, as if he held something in that hurt him nearly as much as he was hurting Tarkin.

Some of the pain ebbed. It was still an agony. It still felt like parts of him were slowly disintegrating, he still shook - Well, now his head was clear enough to _notice_ himself shaking. He could think a little bit better. He could probably speak.

"That," said Tarkin shakily, "was rather more than I usually prefer."

"Now, Governor," said Vader, "you will beg me for mercy."

Theory Of Dealing With Vader: do _not_ be prey. Particularly now, when Vader seemed ready to take any excuse. If Vader learned he could bully Tarkin into submission, the way Vader did with everyone else, then their working relationship would never recover.

"I will not," said Tarkin, wishing very much that the shake would leave his voice. "I will politely ask that you end this pointless display. I will even apologize. My last comment before you threw me was clearly uncalled for, and I retract it. But I will not beg. Not to you."

"You will beg for me to end your pain," Vader insisted. "To give you pleasure again, instead of this nightmare. To let you go."

"I think not."

He gasped as another red wave of agony filled him, panted shallowly in its wake.

"There are more than twenty minutes left in our agreed-upon hour," said Vader. "For that time, you are entirely at my mercy. You will spend each long minute wishing you had breath enough to scream. Or you. Will. Beg."

He had admired the danger of Vader, his sheer destructive force. He had wanted more of that, and now here it was right up against him. Damn it.

Eh, then again, he'd seen Rebels hold out under torture for days without breaking. Tarkin could survive twenty minutes or so.

He summoned as much breath as he reasonably could, resenting himself for the deepening shake in his voice. "Your phantom pains won't break me, Vader."

"As you wish."

In one swift pulse, the pain returned to its disorienting, nauseating level. Tarkin involuntarily groaned. His very limbs were crumbling, breaking apart. His - _no._ He forced himself to keep his eyes open, to look. His body was intact, would always be intact. The rest was a Jedi parlor trick.

He _hissed,_ an impulsive animal sound of defiance.

He kept his eyes open. On another impulse, he looked back up at Vader.

He admired Vader's form, incongruously, still. He had liked this, wanted this - not this level of pain, but this _side_ of Vader. Why did some part of him admire it even now, the sheer pure cruelty, the force of nature that Darth Vader was when he-

Another awful pulse, once, twice. Then Vader made a strange sound, nearly a growl, and without any physical motion at all, the entire sensation flipped inside out.

It was nearly as disorienting as being thrown. The pain shrank in an instant to its original levels. Vader - still hunched oddly, still trembling - had abruptly stopped the torture and gone back to Force-fucking him. Roughly now, not at all like the teasing strokes of before, but an intense, urgent rutting.

Tarkin could not comprehend it at first. Something in him leaned into the sensation, a moth to a pleasure-flame. The tight grip, fast and ragged around his cock. The accompanying pressure inside him, slick and frictionless. Then his mind caught up with him, and he tried, for another moment, to pull away.

This could not be right. He hadn't begged for anything, dammit. He had not _yielded._ This must be a trap. A brief tease before the agony returned, an attempt to remind him there was something to beg for.

Tarkin was already exhausted into hypersensitivity. He tried to count in his head. Imagined TIE fighter schematics, the minutes of the meeting he'd had before Vader that morning, anything dry and safe to stop his body from spilling all over Vader like some sort of adolescent. For a pleasure that wasn't even real, wasn't even meant that way. Only a trap. Surely it was a trap.

But that minute went on, a minute and a half even, and nothing changed. Vader did not jerk him back into agony. Vader made no demands. Vader seemed entirely absorbed.

A new suspicion made its way into Tarkin's head.

What was Vader getting out of all this? He hadn't wondered enough about that. Nobody was touching Vader, Vader wasn't even touching himself. He had begun by carefully mapping out Tarkin's nerve endings, Tarkin's pain, Tarkin's desire. But he had said that Tarkin's pleasure did not matter, that it was a byproduct. That Vader, at the core of it, was only pleasing himself. It seemed to be a contradiction.

But Vader was a Jedi. Vader could feel what Tarkin felt.

Perhaps this was not a trap. Perhaps it was not about Tarkin at all. Perhaps Vader was the one who had broken. Perhaps Vader had liked the torture, liked the defiance, and now Vader was fucking him again because _Vader_ could not restrain his need.

Hesitantly, resisting the urge to cry out, Tarkin looked up into the black pits of Darth Vader's eyes.

He came blindingly hard, the office and everything in it wiped away, only a brilliant spike of passion that seemed to absorb him entirely. Vader kept going without a pause, stroking him roughly through it, until everything was faded and settled and warm.

He was on his office floor, naked, lying on his back on the gray carpet. The pain was entirely gone now. Vader was crouched over him, no longer hunched or trembling, or looking in any way out of the ordinary for Vader. He moved to get up.

A second later, Tarkin's limbs relaxed, rolling into careless, casual positions. He could move his limbs again. The vise around his chest released, and he inhaled deeply. The air smelled like sex, with an undertone of fear-sweat, but a cleaning droid and a visit to the fresher would sort that out.

Vader was already standing. Tarkin attempted to push himself up to a sitting position, but his arms were not steady. Perhaps the carpet for a minute more, then.

He suspected that he had guessed right about Vader. Vader had explored the shape of Tarkin's senses so carefully. _You have as much range as I had hoped,_ he'd said. Vader's body, probably, _was_ too broken to feel much pleasure. But he had opened his senses to Tarkin's completely. He had felt Tarkin's pleasure, Tarkin's pain, for the entire encounter, perhaps as vividly as if it had been his own.

Then that awful interlude toward the end - had he felt that, too? A _self-_ flagellation, in some strange way. Perhaps. Vader had the type of flamboyantly dark personality that made such things possible.

Tarkin smiled to himself. This was fascinating.

Across the room, near the door, Vader had paused to look back at him.

"You did well," he said, "for a beginner. Your curiosity was satisfied?"

Tarkin wanted to jab back at him: he was no such thing. He didn't know how long Vader had been going to the clubs, but Tarkin was not young, and he suspected that his own experience was the longer one, by _several_ years.

But of course, that was not what Vader meant. He was a beginner at his role in this specific thing: this way of meeting Vader's needs.

"Oh, you've answered several questions for me," he said instead. "And raised several more."

The scorn, now that he was relaxed, had crept back into Vader's voice. "I would hate to be disappointing. Next time, perhaps you'll be more circumspect."

Tarkin's arms were steadier now; he hauled himself up and sat, quirking his eyebrows. "Next time?"

"It would seem necessary," said Vader, actively mocking now. "Since you are so concerned about my _availability_."

He swept out, the door hissing open and shut, before Tarkin could formulate a response.

Of course, he thought in amused disgust, flopping back down on the carpet. Of course he would leave now. Because no one in the clubs had ever dared demand that Darth Vader stay for _aftercare._

Well, then. There was nothing for it but to wash himself up for his next task, dress, and call the cleaning droid. He stood with only minor difficulty, gathered up his uniform, and staggered to the fresher.

It occurred to him, now that he was alone, that Vader had not once physically touched him. He wondered now what Vader's gloved hand would feel like, pressed against his bare chest. What that suit and helmet would feel like under his hands, what the cloak would look like bunched in his fist in the heat of passion.

He wanted to know these things now. He did not want to be thrown around the room like that again. But he wanted a next time. He wanted… more.

Vader wanted more, as well, it seemed. He had insisted that Tarkin was nothing, that it did not matter who he used as his toy. But, despite all the mistakes of this hour, he had planned on a next time. Tarkin had been different from the others. Tarkin had refused to break, and Vader, at the last, had _liked_ it. He had covered that liking with scorn, but he had declared in the same breath that there would be a next time, without even asking.

Vader's feelings had betrayed him, too. Hah. Two could play that game, even if only one was a Jedi.

A cleaning droid beeped cheerfully out in the office. Tarkin ignored it as he finished fixing his collar. He looked every bit the Grand Moff again, with no sign that anything untoward had occurred. Vader, too, must be striding back to his shuttle somewhere on the ship, as impassive and unreadable as always. It was only in Tarkin's mind that Vader was different now. He would have to plan his next moves carefully. In time, he was sure, he could train Vader to do all of this properly.

Next time - whenever it was - would be _interesting._


End file.
